Pathologies of society and social philosophy: new perspectives from Finland

Abstract

ABSTRACT The main aim of this paper is to illustrate the distinctive features of the Finnish school of critical theory, focusing especially on its reception of Axel Honneth’s theory of recognition and his ideas regarding the concept of social pathology. In this respect, the article will provide a concise description of the philosophical work of some of its members: Onni Hirvonen, Heikki Ikäheimo, Arto Laitinen and Arvi Särkelä. The paper consists of seven parts. First, the paper will sketch a very general account of Honneth’s theory of recognition and social life, and, secondly, it will describe the ways the Finnish scholars have reinterpreted Honneth's paradigm of recognition. The third part will discuss two conceptions of social pathology that Honneth has explicitly endorsed in his intellectual career: Christopher Zurn’s idea of pathology as a second-order disorder, and the organicist conception of social pathology, which Honneth himself has put forward in his essay The Diseases of Society: Approaching a Nearly Impossible Concept. Part four and five will then look at how the Finnish theoreticians have discussed and criticized these two conceptions of social pathology that are central in Honneth's work. In part six, the paper will briefly introduce some of the more fundamental criticisms that scholars have aimed at Honneth and, more or less directly, at the Finnish scholars. Finally, the article will explain why the new perspectives of Laitinen, Ikäheimo, Hirvonen, and Särkelä are, in any case, consistent with Honneth's philosophical perspective.